Feeling The Difference
by zotlot
Summary: At the end of a scheme, Blair feels a little different from usual. Betrayed, hurt, thinking of giving up, she can't really blamed for giving in to impulse, can she? Dan/Blair, near the beginning of S2.


Title: Feeling the Difference

Fandom: Gossip Girl

Rating: T for safety

Genre: Romance

Characters/Pairings: Dan/Blair Serena, Nate, a glimpse of Chuck

Summary: At the end of a scheme, Blair feels a little different from usual.

A/N: Okay, this is set in the beginning of S2, in my head, thus the reference to the Hamptons. But as I haven't seen S2 since it aired, I don't know how accurate my canon placement is. Just go with it. Also, as this is my first GG fic, I apologize for any OC-ness.

It was the end of a scheme.

It was only a minor one, tiny, really. It was nothing compared to the social destruction of Serena at the Ivy-League mixer, or the complete annihilation of Georgina Sparks right before Lily and Bart's wedding.

Those plots were perfect, they made Blair Waldorf feel like the absolute Queen of the Universe, not just the Upper East Side.

This one? Not so much. All they'd been trying to do was find out whether the supposed case against Chuck over Victrola – for supplying alcohol to minors – was actually a ploy to derail his inheritance of Bass Industries as a whole upon Bart's death. It involved a little bribery, a few tiny little lies, and only four costume changes. Hardly worth the effort.

And now it was at its end. Serena was holding the lift, Nate was sorting out the limo. Even Humphrey, who Nate had dragged into this because nobody who mattered would know who he was, was now down on the sidewalk, making sure Bart didn't come into the building.

So Blair, final stage underway, snuck into the office in front of her, envelope in hand, ready to leave the note that covered their tracks on Bart's desk. And stopped, staring almost unseeingly at the sight before her.

He'd said he didn't do this anymore. And she shouldn't be surprised, really, knowing him as she did. She'd destroyed him back in the Hamptons, and even with the Lord out of the picture, she'd been less-than-friendly towards him for a while now.

But he was supposed to _try_. This was the game now, she played Ice-Queen and he tried to light a fire, and thaw her out. And she was winning, because he hadn't gotten what he wanted yet.

Or so she'd thought. The skinny, vapid-looking blonde currently pressed up between Chuck and the desk would probably beg to differ.

Unbidden, certainly unwelcome tears sprang to Blair's eyes, but she shook them away. He wanted to be a jackass, he could just go ahead. After all, wasn't she the girl who'd despaired of _him_? She won that break-up, she'd moved on first.

She dropped the envelope silently on a nearby end table, and walked quickly away.

Something was very, very wrong here.

The scheme was over, and they had won. And yet, something was still really off… maybe because it had ended not with shopping at Burghdorf's or cocktails at Butter, but with her, Serena, Nate and… Dan Humphrey, watching a movie in the Humphrey Loft.

And for the life of her, she couldn't remember why she had ever agreed to this. God, she'd probably need to disinfect this entire outfit when she got home.

Nate, sat next to her on the sofa, horribly comfortable with the whole setting, accidentally spilt a little of his diet coke when reaching over for more pizza.

Great, now this outfit had to be burned. Blair shuddered inwardly, silently grieving the loss of a Chanel original.

"Oh, jeez Blair I'm sorry!" Nate noticed her discomfort, all of a sudden jolting into handsome-prince mode. "Let me get you a towel or something-"

"No, that's fine." Blair rose elegantly to her feet, "I'll just go freshen up in the bathroom." She walked quickly to the bathroom, refusing to touch anything unless she absolutely had to.

She was just finishing up, dabbing the last of the diet coke out of her skirt, when she heard voices in the living room. Non-movie voices. She was about to leave, join in on – or more likely sit and sniff at – their conversation, when Serena's voice caught her attention.

"What do you mean? He didn't see Blair, right? So it's all cool."

"Look, I think it might be more than that." That tone… compassion and a slight saviour complex. That was Nate, it had to be Nate…

Her brain couldn't process the idea that her ex-boyfriend wasn't the one defending her. Humphrey was. Dan Humphrey, her naive, book-smart, sometimes-nemesis from Brooklyn. "Look, I'm not saying I know her better than you do. And God knows, I'm not the biggest Blair Waldorf fan in the world…" Ah, now, there was the Dan Humphrey she knew and put up with. She'd zoned out for a moment, stunned that, of all the people in that room, it was Humphrey who had worked it out.

"…but nobody needs that kind of pain. You know, knowing that the person you loved lied to you? That they might not love you like you love them?" Blair would have rolled her eyes if she wasn't so… touched? Even if she could just see, in her mind's eye, the unsubtle, slightly accusatory, penetrating look that was probably being aimed at Serena right then and there.

But how did he know? She hadn't told anybody what she'd seen in Bart's office. She'd only told them that Chuck had been just being Chuck, and he'd almost seen her.

She was usually such a good liar. She could talk Serena into believing practically anything if she put her mind into it. Nate too, as a matter of fact. And while neither of them were winning Nobel prizes anytime soon…

Fine, so maybe Dan was a little brighter than he looked. Big deal, it wasn't as if…

"I think she'll be fine, she kinda lives off this kind of thing, you know?" Serena, with an audible shrug.

"Did you not see the look on her face on the ride over here?" Dan was incredulous, as was Blair. She'd been careful to keep her expression normal in the limo.

"Dan, she looked fine. She was probably just… thinking about any holes in the plan, that's all." Nate jumped in, on the wrong side.

"Fine, I'm sure you're right. I just know that there's more to it than what you think, I mean, c'mon, it's _Chuck Bass_."

She couldn't believe it. There was so totally something wrong here now. Then it hit her: hew as defending her because he thought she was weak, and needed some guy to come rescue her. She rolled her eyes, all the favour he'd built up over the past few seconds totally wiped out. If there was one thing Blair was sick of these days, it was inferiors thinking she was weak.

The room went quiet, the TV turned louder, and Blair, trying to mask her emotions, stepped out from the bathroom, looking behind her to turn off the light.

She stepped forwards, looking ahead finally, only to collide with something hard and warm.

Someone, more like. "Oh, sorry, didn't smell you there Cabbage-Patch." She smirked up at Dan, reverting to her old name for him without thinking.

"Blair, you look…" he frowned down at her, "Oddly malicious. What's up?"

The TV was loud enough, and Serena and Nate far away enough, that they couldn't be heard. Good.

"Oh nothing. Just wondering how long it'll take for me to completely disinfect all my clothes." She breezed, walking past him, convinced she'd won.

"Why would you do that? You only changed like, an hour ago." Typical Dan, not knowing when he'd been defeated.

"Yes, well," she turned to face him again, a slightly sneering smile on her face, "I'd hate for my new Chanel to reek of Brooklyn…" she took a dramatic sniff of the actually perfectly-clean air, "and Jenny Humphrey's cheap perfume. I mean, what is that, anyway? Impulse?"

"I wouldn't know, not being a seventeen-year-old girl." He shrugged, seeming to detect the odd note in her voice, "Hey, are you alright?"

"Why?" Okay, not the question she meant to ask, "I mean, why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know, maybe because you spent the whole car ride staring out the window, up until right now you hadn't even insulted me, oh, and the fact that you just happen to have watched roughly half of _I Am Legend_ on my couch without a single comment. C'mon, something's up. Where's the Blair Waldorf I know?"

Oh, was that what they'd been watching? She was caught off-guard. Again. By Humphrey. He had actually noticed something other than Serena's low-cut blouse and the popcorn, and now she had to lie again.

"Yes, well, Will Smith can do wonders for a girl's snark reflex. Not that you'd know, your eyes having been focused solely on my best friend's cleavage all evening."

"Oh Blair, please don't tell me you're jealous." He was grinning openly now, a half-teasing, half-genuine smile that made her want to smile back.

"EW! Please! You wish!" Without thinking, she reached out and hit his arm, like she used to whenever Chuck said those things. "Anyway, Serena might be used to guys acting like idiots by now, but she'll so notice if you're not more subtle about it."

"About what?" He blinked, playing dumb. Or maybe not playing, with him, Blair never could tell.

"She told me about your little beach-tryst in the Hamptons. Public sex, really, Humphrey, I didn't know you had it in you. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so disgusted."

He blushed, a little, and it was almost cute. If it wasn't Dan Humphrey, that is. "She told you? Really? What else did she say?"

"Only that she didn't think it should go anywhere. I know you guys have history but…" she shook her head, the fight draining out of her, "You want her back, she doesn't, please don't drool so visibly anymore." For some reason, she didn't want to talk about this anymore. She was hitting a little close to her own situation as of late.

And, much to her dismay Dan's surprising perceptiveness struck again. "Blair…" He said, quietly, coming a little closer, his hands on her shoulders, "Sure you sure you're okay?"

"Oh my God, I'm fine!" She said, a little loudly.

"Shh, look, it's fine, I get it."

"Well, I'm not upset, not that it's any of your business. And by the way, where do you get off, telling my friends that there's something wrong with me? I mean, okay, maybe I'm not exactly ecstatic that Chuck was making out with a random girl in his dad's office, but…" She trailed off, horrified. How the hell did he do that? She wasn't supposed to tell him that!

"Blair…" now he just sounded sad. "I'm so sorry."

"What?" She was too far gone to care that he was being nice, "No 'I told you so'? No "Well, you deserve it, you're perfect for each other'?" A tear fell down her cheek, smudging her make up. She didn't care.

She didn't know what he was doing. Apparently, neither did he. He stretched out a hand, and brushed the rolling tear off her face with his thumb. "No one deserves something like that. Someone like him."

A bitter laugh escaped her. "Yeah, cause I never cheated on him. I never hurt anyone: I'm Miss Innocent." She muttered, sarcastically.

He laughed quietly, "Well, I never said that. I'm not gonna lie, you can be a real piece of work when you put your mind to it. But that doesn't mean I think you deserve to be hurt."

"How are you so good?" She asked, not having noticed that she was inching closer to him, "You dated Serena, you're best friends with Nate, your sister's _Jenny Humphrey_, the one girl in the city who might actually be more messed up than I am. You should be like the rest of us."

"Who says I'm not?" He asked, a tiny smile playing on his lips.

She scoffed, "You couldn't scheme on your own if your life depended on it."

"So I'm not Chuck Bass. Thank God. But-"

She cut him off; she didn't think, didn't say another word before her lips were on his, her mouth moving furiously over his, his words playing over and over in her head.

… _you don't deserve to be hurt_…

… _I'm not gonna lie_…

…_I'm not Chuck Bass_…

And for a long, spellbound moment, he was completely still. Then he started to kiss her back, his arms wrapping around her waist, pulling her up, pressing her against him. A little moan escaped the back of her throat, and she felt his smile against her lips.

The voice of reason screamed in the back of her head. She was currently kissing Dan Humphrey, he had her backed against the dirty brick wall of his loft, this was amazingly, intensely wrong.

But as his mouth moved from hers and down the column of her neck, eliciting a gasp as he kissed her pulse point, the voice shut up.

And she could feel the difference, here. He wasn't straight-to-the-point, bland like Nate had been, and there was certainly none of the passionate, practiced seductions she was used to with Chuck. There was just a wonderfully honest freshness to Dan - something clean and wholesome and warm that she couldn't get enough of. Not now, with his mouth glued to hers.

They finally broke apart a few minutes later, breathing heavily. She straightened her clothes, "Well, um, that was-"

"Yeah." He looked as stumped as she felt. Amazingly, their friends in the next room still watched the TV, oblivious to anything that had just happened.

"I think I'm gonna have to go clean up again," for some reason, she didn't feel the same deep disgust she was looking for inside. More… satisfaction, at his thoroughly mussed, heavy-breathing state.

"Uh, yeah, you should…" He almost looked disappointed, just for a moment. Then she was gone, sashaying into the bathroom to reapply lipstick and straighten her hair.

The rest of the evening was spent in silence. Nate sat between them on the couch, oblivious to the guilty, flirty, disgusted looks being exchanged behind his back.

And of course, Blair knew that, tomorrow, when Chuck's little misstep stopped hurting so much, she'd seriously regret this. It couldn't end well - she hadn't yet finished with Chuck, revenge plans needed to be thought out, things were too complicated to add a Brooklyn loser into the mix.

There was also the fact that he was in love with her best friend, and that was a situation God knew she was sick of. But at least, she thought with a small smirk, that little scene in the hallway should have given him something to think about…


End file.
